One Too Many
by Liz Hollow
Summary: Lyra plans a surprise birthday party for Ethan, but nothing seems to be going right. In fact, just about everything that can go wrong does. Ethan/Lyra.


**One Too Many**

"No, shh, will you all be quiet? He's going to be here soon!" I hissed at the large group of people waiting behind a coach far too small to adequately hide them. Silver smirked at me, and several people rolled their eyes. Apparently I was taking this whole thing way too seriously, but I had never thrown a surprise birthday party before in my life. And, seeing as this was for the boy I had loved since before I could even remember, as a friend and otherwise, I wanted to make sure it was the perfect party.

I picked up my PokéGear, checking the time: 7:56 p.m. He said he would be back before eight o'clock, so I had told everyone to come to his house at seven to start getting things ready. Now, everyone was becoming rowdy from just sitting around waiting; it wasn't like I could really blame him for being late to his own party that he didn't actually know about. It was all I could do to keep everyone quiet.

Then, hearing the doorknob jiggle, I whispered for everyone to be quiet again, running over to the wall and keeping my hand on the lights. As soon as the door swung open, I hit the switch, the lights flashing before burning out. Everyone rose to their feet, voices muffled in confusion at the fact that the lights had just burned out, but I waved for them to continue.

"Surprise! Happy birthday, Ethan!"

Ethan, much to my chagrin, didn't look surprised at all. He just walked into the living room, stared at all the people with a characteristic grin, and proceeded to look up at the burnt-out light bulb as if having twenty-seven people in his living room was a common occurrence. But I wouldn't necessarily be surprised if it was.

I furrowed my eyebrows, walking over to him and tapping him on the shoulder. "Um, hello? Happy birthday? Surprise?" I shrugged, and he smiled at me, patting my arm and then removing my hat to ruffle my hair. Stealing it back from him, I put my white hat back on, straightening my pigtails as he stared at the other guests.

"Thanks, guys," he finally said, reaching over to the lamp and pulling out the dead light bulb. He shook it, a faint clinking noise coming out of it. "This is really nice of you! And it would have been a really great surprise." Ethan winked at me, and I narrowed my eyes. What did he mean by that? "If there hadn't been dozens of cars parked outside my house. But, hey, you know, that's only a technicality that couldn't have _possibly_ been worked out beforehand."

"What?" I demanded, glaring at Silver. That was my lovely redheaded assistant's job; he was in charge of secrecy, since I figured he would have been pretty good about it. But apparently I was wrong, and he had forgotten to mention this tiny detail about parking outside the house. Because parking outside the house wasn't obvious at all…

Ethan hurried over to the window, drawing the curtains and pointing out to the cars lined up in front of the yard. I smacked a hand to my face, rolling my eyes as I turned to the incompetent guests here to surprise my best friend. Silver just continued to smirk at me like this was all part of some master plan to embarrass me. I wouldn't put it past him to do that.

"Silver, just," I sighed, shaking my head and pointing to the door leading to the basement, "go get a new light bulb or something. I'm going to go get the cake because I can't trust you with that. Ethan." I turned to the dark-haired boy, tapping the tip of his hat and smiling at him. It was a forced smile, but that was probably better than nothing. "You just have fun! Somebody get the music started! This is supposed to be a party!"

I hurried away before I was forced to watch anymore of the chaos unfolding before me. The light finally turned back on as Silver screwed in a new light bulb, and the music blasted. Everyone seemed to be having a good time from what I could see from the kitchen, and I could practically feel the house shaking as everyone danced.

Just as I was beginning to feel like things were finally working out, I noticed one very minor detail. Grabbing my pigtails and tugging on them, I walked over to the gallon of unopened French vanilla ice cream sitting on the counter. I prayed to Arceus that Silver had just taken it out of the freezer, but as I cut the plastic wrapping off the cap and opened it, I found I was wrong. No, he hadn't _just_ taken it out of the freezer.

"Silver!" I screamed, running over to the archway connecting to the living room. He was sitting in a corner on a lone recliner, not partaking in the dancing like Ethan was; Ethan was laughing hysterically and bouncing up and down on his carpeted floor. "Silver, get your ass over here _right now_! You are _so_ dead!"

"Yeah, you really want him to come, don't you, Lyra?" Ethan called back as Silver reluctantly rose from his chair. I rolled my eyes, retreating back into the kitchen and picking up the tub of ice cream, holding it for Silver to see. But when Ethan came into the room before Silver, I put it back on the table, standing in front of it to obscure it from view.

"Uh, hi. Why don't you go back in there?" I hinted, but Ethan just smiled at me. Walking closer, he stopped right in front of me, close enough for me to feel his breath on my face. "Um, yeah, you should really—"

He tried to lean around me, but I pulled the ice cream against my back, moving as Ethan leaned so he couldn't see. "Whatcha hiding?" he wondered, running around the other side of the table. I grabbed the ice cream, facing him and holding the tub behind my back. "Hey, come on, I'm the birthday boy!"

"Yes, which is exactly why you can't know!"

Ethan grinned slyly, walking back around the table and stepping close to me again. This time, he grabbed my forearms, sliding his hands all the way down to my wrists and leaning his forehead against mine. "Is it a present? A surprise?" he whispered, making the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I shivered, pulling one wrist at a time away from him.

"You could say that," I said with a nervous giggle. Because it certainly would be a surprise when he found out that his favorite kind of ice cream—that I knew he would request with his cake—was no longer ice cream at all but more like liquid cream. And I realized it wasn't the biggest deal in the world, but nothing was going right today.

Silver finally made it into the kitchen (who knew what had taken him so long), shoving his hands into his pockets and shrugging at me with a _what did I do_? expression. I narrowed my eyes at him, shoving the ice cream under the kitchen table and pushing Ethan towards the living room. I ignored him as he protested, and he finally just shrugged and gave up.

Pulling the ice cream back out from under the table, I shoved it at Silver. "You left the ice cream out," I said matter-of-factly. "You're on a roll tonight, Silver. But, you know what, I don't even want to fight with you right now because it's Ethan's birthday. Expect a battle tomorrow, though. You're going to lose big time."

"I don't think so." I glared at him, and he sighed. "What do you want me to do now, then, if I ruined everything else?"

I held up my hands, closing my eyes. "Just… nothing. There's been one too many accidents today, and I don't want another. It's not that I don't trust you, Silver, because I do." He looked skeptically at me. "Hey, I do! It's just probably a good idea to allow me to handle the rest of the evening. No hard feelings."

Smiling at him, I whacked him on the arm. He just shrugged, handing the liquid ice cream back to me and walking out of the room without another word.

He took that well.

I pulled the cake out of the refrigerator, placing it on the counter. At least the cake looked nice; in ornate frosting, Ethan's mom (who had made the cake for the party), wrote, "Happy 18th Birthday, Ethan", and decorated it in the shape of a Poké Ball. I was pretty impressed, if only because my baking skills were lacking.

The eighteen candles I had placed around the circumference of the cake was a nice touch, I thought, and when I finally lit all of them, it made the cake glow. Picking up the cake, I walked towards the archway, carefully balancing the cake in one hand while attempting to hit the lights with my other. "Cake!" I shouted.

Even as Silver turned down the music for me, people continued to dance. As I entered the room, walking towards Ethan with a goofy grin on my face, starting to sing just to get everyone's attention. Others began to sing along with me, but one boy in particular wasn't getting the message. And when he bumped into me, I just about lost it.

The cake, candles still alight, slipped out of my hands and tumbled towards the floor. I muffled a scream as I reached down to grab it, but it splattered on the floor in front of Ethan. The candles burnt out, the frosting stained the carpet, and the cake was no longer edible. I stared in horror at the mass on the floor.

Several people began to murmur, and I hurried out of the room to get the trash can and paper towels. I was near hyperventilating, tears clearly flowing out of my eyes. I hadn't imagined that the evening could get any worse, but somehow, it managed to happen. Had it been anyone else, yes, that would have been bad. But this was Ethan.

"Lyra, let me help you," Ethan said, walking into the kitchen. I shook my head, brushing past him and walking into the living room. I scooped the cake up with my bare hands and threw it into the trash can. Moments later, a second pair of hands began to help me, and I stared sadly at the boy I loved.

"Ethan, it's your birthday. You're not supposed to help."

Ethan just shrugged, scooping more into the trash can until the cake was mostly off the ground. Silver took the paper towels from me and began scrubbing at the ground. Everything was just so terrible. This was the worst surprise birthday party ever.

I left to go back into the kitchen, putting the trash can back in its rightful spot. But by now I was so embarrassed that I didn't want to leave the kitchen at all. Or, better yet, I could sneak out the back door and just leave the house entirely, never to return. Because I never wanted to show my face again.

"It's okay, you know."

I stared at Ethan as he reentered the kitchen, shaking my head. "Oh no, everything is going _completely_ wrong." I put a hand to my cheek, leaning against his refrigerator and sighing. "You weren't surprised, the light in the living room burned out, I dropped the cake, and the ice cream all melted because Silver forgot to put it back in the freezer…" I picked up the tub of ice cream and showed it to him. "I don't think this could have gone any worse."

"Hey, hey, it's okay," Ethan reassured me, rubbing my arms and smiling at me. I knew, of course, that he was just being nice. He was always nice to me. Sarcastic, maybe, and sometimes he could be a real prick in a joking way. But he always said the nicest things to me, and I really loved having him for a best friend. "I like melted ice cream. I can eat it like soup. And what about the five second rule? I mean, that was more like a hundred, but close enough, right? Gotta build our immune systems somehow. I'll even eat that cake out of the trash if it makes you happy."

"Shut up," I said, though he got me to smile. "That disgusting."

"Lyra, who _cares_ if nothing went right? At least you tried. It's the thought that counts." He paused, looking at the ice cream. "Besides, it's kind of funny this way. It's a party I'll definitely never forget."

I put the ice cream down, snapping my fingers. "Damn."

"And there are always presents!" Ethan exclaimed, and I shrugged. Everybody else's presents would make a nice conclusion to the party. There was no possible way I could screw this up (unless I set the whole house on fire or something). I was kind of hoping that wouldn't happen, but I crossed my fingers just in case.

So, he opened all the presents, and nothing went wrong. He laughed at the funny presents, holding them above his head and shouting about them. He liked the serious ones, telling everybody who brought him one of that nature that "he really needed one of those". He obtained quite a nice collection of gifts, and nothing bad happened.

The party concluded without so much as another mess. But since I had made most of the messes (in other words, I had created the lovely stain on the carpet from the cake), I agreed to stay and help clean up. Well, more like I forced Ethan to let me stay and help clean up. But it was basically the same thing.

"You don't have to do it alone," Ethan told me as I got down on my knees and began scrubbing at the stain. Several of the candles had singed the carpet when the cake had fallen, as well, and that would be hard to undo. "Why don't you let someone help you?"

"Because."

He rolled his eyes at me as he dropped down beside me, spraying more solution on the beige carpet. "You know things go faster with two people?"

I just continued to scrub, but he was right. With twice the manpower, the stain was gone in minutes, replaced with just a wet spot from the cleaning solution. Standing up and admiring our handy work, I was fairly impressed—and slightly annoyed—that Ethan had been correct. All the more reason I loved the kid.

I apologize again, heading for the door when Ethan stopped me, grabbing my wrist and spinning me back. I stared at his eyes, partially obscured in the shadow of his hat, but I could tell they were glowing with a certain joy.

"Don't forget your party favor."

"Party—" I started, but he covered my mouth with his, kissing me and forcing me to stop talking. As he wrapped his arms around my waist, I wrapped mine around his neck, barely able to contain the happiness I was feeling at that moment. Perhaps this birthday party wasn't so bad. I liked the party favors.

He broke away from me, smiling at me with twinkling eyes. "Don't worry, you're the only one who got that favor. I picked it out specially for you."

I laughed, batting his hat with my hand. He opened the door for me, and I stepped outside, looking back at him. Yeah. Maybe the party wasn't _that_ bad.

"Happy birthday, Ethan."

No. It wasn't bad at all.

* * *

**Author's Note:** I wrote this for a contest! I don't know how good it is, but… whatever. The contest just requests that you write something about a birthday (for any of the trio; that's Ethan, Lyra, and Silver).

It's basically my first Ethan/Lyra fic. I like the two of them, actually. A lot. They're a cute couple! (And Lyra can literally be paired with anyone, so it's all good.)

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon.


End file.
